Walking towards the mountain last Sunday morning, to the dam on Houdconstant farm. Pomegranates, oranges, grapes. Where we disturbed a small flock of dark spurwinged geese. As we tried to get closer for a photo, they took off, in bunches, circled and settled, elsewhere. One of the few dams that still has water, after the summer, harvesting what drains down from the mountain. The nearby Voelvlei dam supplies the city of Cape Town with water.
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| Houdconstant farm dam |
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| Spurwinged geese |
Back in town we find some Yard Art. They look peaceful and comfortable. And blind! But I guess they are dozing in the afternoon sun, an open book discarded on his lap. Quiet greige, not the usual garden gnome palette.
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| Yard Art |
(Our cold weather comes across the Atlantic straight up from Antarctica - southernmost Cape Agulhas to Antarctica six thousand kilometres away). We are 33 degrees South. Level with Perth and north of all New Zealand, with its frost-fighting-wind-machines amongst the vines. Approximately level with Santiago/Chile and Buenos Aires/Argentina in South America. If you Northerners are sick of snow, be kind to us. In the Western Cape snow is a bit Camelot, a dusting on the mountain peaks – no frost in the garden, no icy roads, just cold enough to enjoy a fire in the evening.
PS 33rd parallel North goes thru Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Tripoli in Libya. Golan Heights in Israel, Syria, Iraq, Iran. Khyber Pass in Pakistan, Kashmir and Pradesh in India, Tibet. Japan. California, Arizona, New Mexico, Georgia ... in the USA. Circling round to Madeira off Portugal.
Today, a day late, we head in the opposite direction, towards the sea, and in the car. A little too far to walk with pleasure, but only minutes by car. Past the so-called coloured part of town, Monte Bertha, with a spectacular view of our snowy mountains. Our house is on the PANDA (previously advantaged now disadvantaged) side, where the snow is hidden by the foothills and the Olifantskop in my header.
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| Groot Winterhoek |
The wheat was harvested, the stubble was burnt. Now the rain has softened the ground, the farmers are out in the fields with tractors. Turning over damp soil which looks promising. Instead of ploughing dry dust which blows away in horrifying clouds. There goes our topsoil. Altho our neighbour once told me, that the farmers have to plough and plant the seeds by a set date, or the insurance won’t pay. The farmer knows the ground is too hard and dry, but his hands are tied.
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| Field furrows |
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| In the fields |
This is the earliest we have had such cold weather since the Seventies. We have gratefully received twice as much rain this April as last year. Busy pruning, then spreading cuttings of happy plants in our garden. Repetition, repetition, repetition. Somewhere, after the pond, for the eye to rest, as we have no lawn.
Pictures by Jurg and Diana,
(If you mouse over brown text, it turns shriek pink.
Those are my links)
There is something magical about snow on mountains. Best of all is snow covered mountains by the sea - you live in a near perfect spot for that! Ridiculous about the insurance dictating when a farmer should sow seed.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting post, Diana. Spring wheat is being harvested in this area and summer crops like peanuts planted. Corn is already knee high if you have short knees like mine.
ReplyDeleteWe had dirt blowing on Wednesday, so thick I could hardly see on the way home from town. Thursday we had severe thunderstorms. Today is cool and sunny with wind from the north.
Blotanical is unavailable this morning. Does that mean the changes are being uploaded? I hope so.
I am glad you have gotten more rain than you usually do. That always helps in the garden. The mountain with snow is simply majestic.
ReplyDelete" In the Western Cape snow is a bit Camelot, a dusting on the mountain peaks – no frost in the garden, no icy roads, just cold enough to enjoy a fire in the evening."... what a lovely sentence, how I wish this panda had written it!
ReplyDelete;) Jack
Jack - panda to panda, it was our from Northern England neighbour who taught me that word ;~))
ReplyDeleteYou really do live in a beautiful country. Hard to believe snow would ever come your way, even on the mountain top. But they do look pretty high.
ReplyDeleteDiana, The photo of snow on the mountains looked a lot like the winter scene when I lived in southern California many years ago. It would be 70F where we were, but people would bundle kids, sleds, and warm coats into the car and "drive to the snow." (This was a hard concept for me to wrap my New England brain around.) Just out of curiosity, I looked up the latitude of the community where we lived, and it is 34 N. -Jean
ReplyDeleteGreenapples - It is 2077 metres high. 6814 feet to you.
ReplyDeleteJean - bundling the kids into the snow, is exactly why a reader came hunting on my blog ;~)
Oh no...SNOW or the 'S' word..didn't expect to find that in Elephant Eye land. I have had enough of snow to last me a lifetime!
ReplyDeleteJane x
PS Serves me right for emigrating to Canada.
Thanks for putting the link to the frost windmachines.
ReplyDeleteWhile there is always the possibility of thick snow on the ground here it usually is just on the mountaintops. And like you we have dry dry landscape here, looking up at snow there.
Hi Diana, interesting post yes - but topped off by the wonderful video that I somehow hadn't seen although 17 and a half million people had watched it! I thought it was much more dynamic and fun than the actual one. I have never been to Africa and probably never will, so posts like this are wonderful to give me a real sense of the place. cheers, catmint
ReplyDeleteYou are not able to search my blog but I do have a labels list if you scroll down the right hand side bar. I AM updating it....slowly!!
ReplyDeleteJane x
Why Canada? when it is minus 35C I ask myself the very same question!
Do your dams really lose water or do they just have low water levels?
ReplyDeleteVery interesting about 33 degrees south and 33rd parallel north. "Nice to know" information as my wife would call it. At least you still get to see snow even if you need a short drive for the view. :-D
Bom - these are farm dams. It is not lose water, but use water. The rain, or borehole water, is harvested to irrigate the crops. In the top picture you can just see pomegranate and orange orchards. The Western Cape wine and table grapes are all under irrigation. Thru the summer the water levels in the dams, and the rivers, sinks.
ReplyDeleteDiana, so glad to see that you've finally gotten some "respectable" rain, or at least enough to settle the dust. We're still at .14 inches (about 4 mm) for the year. :/ Thanks for including the latitude comparison--really interesting.
ReplyDeleteLovely post, I love the sight of snow topped mountains rising above a plain. It reminds me very much of central Oregon.
ReplyDeleteI have to admit but those are very sweet gnomes. I have never seen the sleepy peaceful variety. Thank you so much for the link.
Cyndy - if our winter would be awful, it would be floods. Going into our fifth winter here, two were flooded out, but we have worked on rain gardening since.
ReplyDeleteI don't mind the cold, I just hope we will have a wet winter here in Port Elizabeth. As for snow, I hope we will have snow somewhere nearby thise year over a weekend so that we can take the kids.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the geography lesson Diana. How on earth did you manage to get a hold of those flattering sculptures of myself and Myra.
ReplyDeleteAhh, now I understand where you are and why your weather is like it is..AZ and New Mexico..I lived or visited both...I love snow that visits briefly and cool nights...enjoy!!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your post. We're not quite on the 33rd parallel, but only about half a degree from being neighbors in the parallel hemisphere. There's a restaurant in town that specializes in food from all along our parallel, with the thought that similar climates might eat in similar ways. Often they do.
ReplyDeletehi and tnx for ur nice cooments, I added u to my bloglist
ReplyDelete